Date

Country

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Keywords

Region

Africa
Arab States
Asia and the Pacific
Europe and North America
Latin America and the Caribbean

World Heritage Youth Forum (2016) Africa

Thursday 28 Apr 2016
Wednesday 04 May 2016

This forum will address young people and seek to provide a sustainable platform for youth in Africa that could increase the involvement of youth in the promotion and protection of World Heritage in Africa, and also deliver essential feedback to UNESCO, the World Heritage Committee and the African World Heritage Fund (AWHF) on youth challenges, accomplishments and actions related to the implementation of the World Heritage Convention in the region. It responds to the interest expressed by States Parties to hold a youth forum at a regional level as well as to the Second Cycle of Periodic Reporting in the Africa Region, which called for increased involvement and benefits for local communities in World Heritage.This is the first regional youth forum on World Heritage in Africa. It will address Anglophone youth. A second forum is planned for 2017 targeting francophone youth in Africa.

World Heritage Youth ForumsThe UNESCO World Heritage Education Programme is one of UNESCO's most successful flagship programmes for young people, generating awareness-raising and capacity building activities that enhance the visibility of the Convention and facilitate the greater involvement of young people, including women and indigenous communities, their empowerment and inclusion to contribute to World Heritage conservation. One of the major activities is the World Heritage Youth Forum that has become an annual event, organized and held in close conjunction with the yearly session of the World Heritage Committee.

These fora provide the opportunity for young people to exchange experiences, to discuss common concerns, to discover new roles for themselves in heritage conservation and have their voices heard. Each youth forum take up specific issues linked to World Heritage and carry out hands-on activities that provides some basic skills in conservation and preservation, contributing to the promotion of World Heritage education and youth involvement.